“Yes! I feel the same way,” I reciprocated with zest. I thought she was articulating a creative metaphor, one whose whimsy evoked the euphoria of erotic love.

“No, I really do.” Melinda, it turned out, had taken tap lessons before we’d met, and she’d been speaking literally. She still had the shoes somewhere, she said.

“Tire Stud” was published at Justus Roux's Erotic Tales in 2011.

“Hi, Mitch. I’m Ruth. Do you mind if I feel your tread?”

He smiled. “Why not? After all, I don’t have any biceps to speak of.”

He bent an elbow and offered me a forearm. I ran my finger, with slow ecstasy, along one of the sensuous grooves. The soft, squishy sound of my fingertip dragging along the rubber seemed thunderous in my ears, and I could swear I felt his skin warming through the rubber, beneath my touch.

“Do Friends Tickle?” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

“Don’t tickle me, now,” she said.

I didn’t know what it was about the way she made this remark that suggested it might be more an invitation than an admonition. Maybe it was the fact that she’d spoken with a hint of light laughter, as if someone were already tickling her—as if just the idea of being tickled was ticklish to her.

“Dropping the Hint” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

Dora, as I said, has one or two eccentric habits, and she often greets me at the door with a laboratory-grade eyedropper behind her back.

“If We Were ...” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

She continued. “I think the difference between how I feel about sexy women and how I feel about sexy men is sort of like the difference between how I feel about painting versus sculpture. Paintings are my whole world. I eat, drink, and breathe them, I’m thinking about them all the time, and I practically live in the landscape gallery of the museum at school. If I could, I’d crawl into a painting at night instead of a bed. Whereas sculpture—hey, I like fine sculpture. Nice stuff, keep up the good work. But I wouldn’t put one in my house or anything.”

“Doing the Math” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

Time slows down while conflicting and contradictory thoughts fly back and forth across his mind like bats: She said to. I’m married. It’s mistletoe. Christmas is over. She’s a colleague. She’s comfortable with it. Sharon wouldn’t like it. Sharon would like it.

While he wandered the festival, he replayed their history in his mind. And he laughed at himself for thinking of it as a “history”: technically speaking, they had no history together—or at least no History. Had they ever even interacted outside of business hours? Calvin couldn’t remember a single time when he and Louise had headed in the same direction after locking up the store, or when they’d deliberately or even serendipitously intersected at a party or club. As discussed, she was always heading east when he was heading west; going home when he was going out; seeing a play when he was hearing a band; walking toward the quays when he was biking toward the park.

Even in two pieces, thought Sal, Nora was absurdly fetching. Before Danny closed his case again, she stole a fond glance at the exquisitely curled woolen head of black hair; the glimmering marbles painted to resemble cerulean eyes; and the rubber lips that had been dyed the brightest scarlet, to ensure they’d show up pert and pretty as far away as the balcony seats.

It was not the mere fact that she was reclining on her bed, alone in her room with Malcolm, that had given rise to this sense of possibility. In a world of one-room dorm habitations, many a platonic study session, TV night, and chummy heart-to-heart near a bed-qua-chair or a bed-qua-desk had been shared between Malcolm and various women friends. No, being alone with a woman who was on her bed in her room was nothing unusual and did not automatically imply sex. There was something more than walls and furniture informing the atmosphere tonight.

“Get On, Get Off” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

Get on, get off when you fly in masturbation class! Only from Zirbin Airlines.

Trendsetting tycoon Maxwell Zirbin had definitely outdone himself this time.

“Laura the Laugher” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

It was quite brief, but it rang across the room and sizzled down Regina’s spine, coming to rest at the small of her back. Laura followed it with an even briefer trill, and Regina found her buttocks shifting involuntarily. She felt embarrassed ... yet curious. What was funny? And why did the pretty, irrelevant laughter seem to resonate with every cocktail glass and beer bottle in the nightclub—and with Regina’s bones?

Desmond was confused. “Really? You don’t seem like it. I mean ... you weren’t inhibited, for instance, about asking if I was watching your ass the other day. That was delightfully cheeky. As is your ass itself.”

“Ah, but that was just talk,” she replied. “When it comes to the physical, the inhibitions kick in. Even for kissing, even for hand-holding. I’ve always been this way, I’m afraid.”

“Oh,” said Desmond, trying not to look too disappointed. The last thing he wanted to do was be selfish or appear insensitive.

But Kerry brightened. “So that’s the problem. However, there is a solution to hand. I’ve used it before, and it works like a charm. You just have to be OK with it.”

“Oh, naturally I’m OK with it.” He nearly shouted his relief. “Bring on the solution!”

“Let me tell you about it first. It’s a little odd.”

“Slightly Ajar” was published at Justus Roux's Erotic Tales in 2011.

First, she started to leave the door slightly ajar. More or less closed—but not, technically, shut.

She began, early in my visit, by instructing me in area geography. This I was receptive to—especially the way she taught it, using her body. The left leg was Oakland; the right, San Francisco.

“Mindy’s Pheromones” was published at Every Night Erotica in 2011.Part 1. Part 2.

Over the next few days, my sense of smell finally seduced my other senses. Now I could not look at Mindy without admiring the subtle grace of her features; I could not listen to her talk without feeling tremors. How, I marveled, could I ever have found her looks to be bland and her voice to be ordinary? I began to see my previous unresponsiveness to her physical charms as a reflection on my own shortcomings.

“An Eye for Aesthetics” was published in Desire Presents Swinging magazine in 2011.

She’d never even fantasized about a foursome, let alone contemplated it seriously. She’d never fantasized about a threesome, for that matter. Colleen had healthy carnal appetites and a vivid sexual imagination, but her creativity generally ran to exotic one-on-one vignettes.

But the two characters hogging the cruise ship’s billiard table were so aesthetic to Colleen.

Sex at Work (ed. Miranda Forbes) includes “Marriage of Convenience.”Xcite Books (2011), ISBN-13 978-1907016103. Also available in the e-book Under the Desk.

They were distracted by the fulfilling insanity of their professional lives, but not too distracted to take advantage of every opportunity they had to enjoy each other’s personalities and bodies and scents and erogenous zones and sexual imaginations. Day after day, this uncommitted couple, who had been matched up for the screen by producers and agents, matched themselves up in the most physically intimate ways they could find.

She stopped just before an intersection. From her vantage point, the fair was infinite: The parade of delicacies continued in all directions, with the usual traffic diverted into another world. She hesitated while considering which way to proceed.

“Hey, Peach.”

She turned her head. The woman at the last booth on the block had beautiful gray eyes, and they were locked on Nancy’s.

“Want to try some vegan yummies?”

Why did the way she said that innocent word, yummies, make Nancy feel as if the woman were grabbing her ripe summer ass?